A Bangladesh court on Monday sentenced the country’s former prime minister, Sheikh Hasina, to death after finding her guilty of crimes against humanity linked to the deadly crackdown on a student-led uprising that toppled her government in August 2024.
Cheers broke out inside the packed courtroom in Dhaka as the presiding judge, Golam Mortuza Mozumder, read the verdict during a session broadcast live on national television.
“All the… elements constituting crimes against humanity have been fulfilled,” Justice Mozumder declared.
Hasina, 78, who refused to return from India to attend the trial despite repeated court orders, was convicted on three counts, including incitement, ordering killings, and failure to prevent atrocities.
“We have decided to inflict her with only one sentence, that is, sentence of death,” the judge ruled to loud approval from the courtroom audience.
Alongside Hasina, former interior minister Asaduzzaman Khan Kamal, also tried in absentia as a fugitive, received a death sentence after the court found him guilty on four counts of crimes against humanity.
The country’s former police chief, Chowdhury Abdullah Al-Mamun, who appeared in court and pleaded guilty, was handed a five-year prison term.
Bangladesh has remained deeply unstable since Hasina’s fall from power, with political violence surging ahead of elections expected in February 2026.
The United Nations estimates that up to 1,400 people were killed as security forces cracked down on protesters during Hasina’s final months in office, casualties that formed the backbone of the prosecution’s case.
Prosecutors filed five charges against her, including failure to prevent killings — offences classified as crimes against humanity under Bangladeshi law.
Chief prosecutor Tajul Islam, speaking before the ruling, said he hoped the judgment would finally satisfy the public’s long-standing demand for accountability.
He said the verdict would “mark an end to crimes against humanity”.
The former prime minister, who ruled Bangladesh for three consecutive terms before her ouster, dismissed the proceedings as politically motivated.
Hasina refused to recognise the authority of the court and declined to engage with her state-appointed lawyer.
During the months-long trial, witnesses testified that she ordered mass killings and directed the violent suppression of the uprising, claims she rejected in a written interview with AFP in October.
She described the trial as a “jurisprudential joke” and insisted the guilty verdict was “preordained,” adding: “I would not be surprised when it comes.”
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